The '''Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem in North and South America''' as a jurisdiction comprises the [[parish]]es of the [[Church of Jerusalem]] under the [[omophorion]] of His Beatitude, Patriarch [[Theophilus III (Giannopoulos) of Jerusalem]], represented in America by Archbishop Damaskinos of Jaffa.

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The churches belonging to the Patriarchate of Jerusalem in North and South America are technically referred to as belonging to the '''Epitropia of the Holy Sepulchre in America''' since the Church of Jerusalem does not have any local resident [[diocese]] but is essentially a representational or diplomatic church (i.e. a [[metochion]]).

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The Jerusalem Patriarchate has a long history in the United States dating back to the 1920s but has recently become more established with the appointment of Archbishop Damaskinos of Jaffa as Epitropos in 2002. Under Damaskinos' leadership there has been significant development in the past several years. It includes fifteen parishes and two monasteries, the [[Monastery of the Glorious Ascension (Resaca, Georgia)]] and the Monastery of the Holy Cross in East Setauket, NY, which also serves as the headquarters of the jurisdiction in America.

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Tensions exist between this jurisdiction and the [[Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America]], as the latter claims that Jerusalem has worked to pull parishioners away from Antiochian (and [[Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America|Greek]]) parishes and into its own jurisdiction. The Ben Lomond crisis of 1998, in which an Antiochian parish in California split into two factions, one of which eventually made its way into the Jerusalem Patriarchate (including the re-[[ordination]] of some of the clergy), further exacerbated these tensions.

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As a result, as of [[May 2]], 2003, American Antiochian [[clergy]] are forbidden by their [[primate]] from [[concelebration|concelebrating]] with American Jerusalem clergy (though not with clergy of the Jerusalem Patriarchate assigned to parishes in the Middle East).